Chapter Text
Kagami wasn’t an idiot.
People said he was an idiot — loudly, frequently, and mostly Uncle Izuna — but Uncle Izuna also got lost in his own house last week, so Kagami was choosing not to take criticism from a man who could lose a fight with a sliding door.
Point being:
Kagami could put two and two together.
(Kagami sometimes put one and one together and got seven, but that was beside the point.)
Tobirama-sensei had talked to him. Actually talked.
About himself.
About his soulmate, of all things — which, wow, huge trust, extremely illegal privilege for someone Kagami had once accidentally set on fire.
So, Kagmi was gonna be a good student and show him that he wasn’t gonna be rejected by his soulmate! Like, why would anyone reject Tobirama-sensei? He’s cool! And strong! And terrifying in a way that Kagami some day hoped to achieve!
Why would anyone reject him? Crazy people, that’s who.
Only one problem: Kagami didn’t exactly know who Tobirama-sensei’s soulmate was, but he could make a list. Use his brain a bit. Do some maths.
…And, holy shit, the math was mathing.
–
Tobirama-sensei had said that his soulmate had “very distinctive eyes” — which probably, definitely, meant that the soulmate had a dōjutsu. Now, Kagami could guess that the soulmate was an Uchiha, because there were only two dōjutsu-wielding clans around. And, since Sensei had said that he’d killed people of his soulmate's clan, it was definitely an Uchiha.
Since it was well known that the Hyuga and Senju had not clashed in, like, a hundred years, way before Tobirama-sensi’s time, they also typically kept to different sides of the continent, and not getting in each other’s way. So, Tobirama-sensei has not killed a lot of Hyugas — barely any, honestly.
…Which leads to Kagami now needing to narrow down the list further.
Tobirama-sensei was twenty-four.
Soulmates under seventeen? Illegal. Weird. Uncomfortable.
Soulmates over forty? Also weird. Also uncomfortable. Also statistically unlikely.
Kagami eliminated both ends.
The list shrunk.
Not enough.
Apparently, there were too many Uchiha running around being “powerful” and “available.” Ugh. Also, Kagami had no clue if Tobirama-sensei liked boys or girls. Thanks a lot, Sensei. That would’ve made this math at least fifty percent easier.
Next, the soulmate had to be “famous” and “powerful.” Kagami liked to think power was just scaring people on the battlefield, but apparently that wasn’t it. Uncle Hikaku was “powerful” and nobody even saw him fight. What a cheat.
The tricky bit: how powerful was Tobirama-sensei’s soulmate, really? Probably scary-powerful, since the White Demon himself said so. Okay, so at least in the same ballpark as Uncle Izuna, maybe slightly lower. Fine, Kagami could work with that.
Now, being famous was very subjective — everyone was famous if you asked their grandma.
Ok, so, that was pretty much all the variables Kagami had figured out. And, the list is much shorter than he expected. Like, much shorter.
Like….only ten names long.
…It was, for sure, not Aunty Kaori. They’ll hate each other the moment they meet. He crossed the name out. Not Hikari-nee, either — Kagami just couldn’t see Tobirama-sensei with a guy who called everyone “bro”. Ew. Kagami went through the list, cutting off names that just….felt wrong, until he was left with about three.
–
And, of course there was the contact lenses thing. The trickiest part. If he’d just known what Tobirama-sensei’s natural eye colour was, everything would make sense.
Maybe. Probably. Hopefully. Kagami was allowed to fantasize, okay?
Most just believed that this was one of those eccentricities, that Tobirama-sensei had a thing for red eyes. Maybe to match the tattoos on his face?
Anyways, that should cut Uncle Madara. Except…Kagami didn’t quite believe the whole contact thing.
Ok, so the contact lenses thing: no one outside the Senju Clan – and even most on the inside – actually knew his actual eye colour. Sensei was…ecentric.
Every couple of weeks, he would turn up with brown eyes. Would say that he’d lost his contact lenses, or that he’d forgotten them, or he’d not have time to put them on, or something.
Everyone seemed to believe him. Afterall, all powerful shinobi had their quirks— some went around obsessing over plants, some went around setting things on fire, some went around doing…stuff. The point was, all powerful shinobi were kinda eccentric.
Most just believed that this was one of those eccentricities, that Tobirama-sensei had a thing for red eyes. Maybe to match the face-tattoos?
Anyways, that should cut Uncle Madara. Except…Kagami didn’t quite believe the whole contact lenses thing. Actually, he found it bullshit.
It happened, almost like clockwork, every couple of weeks. Yes, yes, sometimes it skipped a turn, or it was earlier or later, but that didn’t change the fact: it was almost like a sort of...reminder, that Tobirama his “real” eyes were brown.
And, look, not a single brown soulmate-eyed candidate in sight.
Kagami circled a name, a grin forming. He was pretty sure who Tobirama-sensei’s soulmate was.
—
Madara heard a knock, and since he could sense that it was Kagami — small, insistent, practically vibrating with nervousness — he called him in. Anything to run away from the mountain of paperwork Senju Tobirama had dumped on him. Really nice of him, really.
Kagami shuffled into the room, clutching what looked like a tiny, tattered notepad. His shoulders were tense, his small hands gripping the edges like they might snap under pressure. “Hi,” he said, voice quiet at first, but rising just enough that Madara could feel the unspent energy in it.
Madara raised an eyebrow. “Hello.”
Kagami took a very deep breath, chest puffing, shoulders rolling back, and exhaled with the sort of exaggerated drama usually reserved for staged plays. “If…if your soulmate is from another clan, what do you do?”
Madara’s eyebrow arched even higher. He had anticipated some sort of question— questions about missions, training, or chakra control — but this? This was a bit of a curveball. “Well…it depends on the situation, the clan in question. Why do you ask?”
Kagami scrunched his face like he was balancing several conflicting emotions at once — curiosity, worry, and the unmistakable spark of mischief. “And if the situation is…I dunno…from an enemy clan?”
Madara leaned back, arms crossed, tapping a finger against his forearm. “Kagami. You don’t need to stress about your soulmate eye manifesting.”
A barely perceptible grumble slid from Kagami’s lips. His gaze flicked down at his notepad, then back to Madara, chin tilted like a miniature general planning a full-scale operation. Was this…a problem? Should Madara intervene? Should he drag the kid to someone responsible, like Aida-san? Get him to talk? Something? Madara wasn’t entirely sure.
“No, I mean, like, what if…hypothetically, hypothetically, your soulmate is a Senju. What would you do?” The words tumbled out, quick and hesitant, each one weighted with a strange kind of courage.
Madara blinked, momentarily taken aback. Fingers twitched, itching to rub at his soulmate’s eye. “Well…we are at peace right now, Kagami, I guess I would take them to dinner.”
Kagami’s eyes narrowed into the most intense scowl Madara had seen from someone twice his size. “No! I mean, like, a shinobi. Who’s killed a lot of our clansmen. Would you…would you reject them?”
Madara paused, the words lingering in the air, heavy with implications. He considered it carefully. “It depends, really. Did they enjoy killing Uchiha? Or was it something they just…had to do? To protect themselves? …Anyways, Kagami, stop stressing about your soulmate. I’m sure they’ll love you, and you’ll love them.”
Kagami’s jaw set. He let out a long, exaggerated “urgh,” like he was physically pushing the words away, and turned on his heel. Feet pattered against the floor as he ran off.
Madara leaned back in his chair, exhaling slowly. His fingers brushed unconsciously against his own eye again. The faint buzz of chakra was still there. He let the feeling wash over him for a moment.
Weird kid, Kagami. Or, well, a weird generation, really — all of Kagami’s generation were weird. Energetic, curious, annoyingly persistent, and entirely too clever for their own good. Madara smiled faintly. He wouldn’t trade that chaos for the world.
–
Madara found that he had a problem. He was starting to…like Senju Tobirama.
At first, at the very start, Madara had wanted to pummel him. That man had hurt his brother, left him bleeding, so, so many times.
But then, inexplainably, Izuna had started to just go…spar with him. Apparently, Izuna had been itching for a fight, which he was no longer getting in peace-time, and just dragged Tobirama to the training grounds. When Madara had seen him come back, bruised all over, with a black eye, he’d been ready to march over to Hashirama’s house and demand answers.
But then Izuna stopped him, smiling. Said that it’d been “just a spar”, and “felt normal”, and it was “fucking fun!”
Madara had decided to fret over him for the rest of the night.
The next day, Senju Tobirama came up to him and dropped off a bucket-load of paperwork. As you can tell, Madara was pissed. However, when he was gonna try and get the man too…lessen the paperwork, somehow, he found something that pissed him off more.
It turned out that Senju Tobirama was now his nephew’s sensei. Which…okay, but also bad.
And Kagami wouldn’t even listen to him, and stubbornly kept going back to the damned man’s house!
Madara had hesitantly decided to leave them be, on the condition that Kagami would tell him everything Tobirama was taught him.
He’d been expecting complaints of a strict man. Or maybe some embarrassing mishaps about the White Demon.
What he got was a very detailed report of everything “Tobirama-sensei” likes. Apparently, the man really liked blueberries. Who knew? Not Madara, until Kagami told him.
And it was all the weirdest thing to report about, too. Like, “Tobirama-sensei hates sushi for dinner”, and “He hates a lot of fabrics, ‘cos he has sensitive skin,” and “He’s very reckless — skips meals and forgets to sleep!”
Madara ....did not need to know this much about Senju Tobirama, the White Demon, ghost of the battlefield. It humanized him in a way Madara didn’t quite like.
Back to the present: Uchiha Madara was starting to like Senju Tobirama. He was starting to look forward to Kagami’s reports about the man.
They made Tobirama feel like a person, a normal person, with terrible self-care, rather than an emotionless-killer.
–
Kagami crackled, rubbing his hands together.
Heh! This was the best idea ever. He was gonna get Uncle Madara and Tobirama-sensei together. They would be really cute together. Maybe.
Also, then he can get spoiled twice, because he has two dads, who will fight to be the Best Dad!